Monday, February 23, 2009

Akira Kurosawa's "Ran" being released on Blu Ray by The Criterion Collection in May

by Chris MaGee

So far this year The Criterion Collection is continuing to add classic titles from Japanese cinema to their library with the upcoming releases of their Eclipse Hiroshi Shimizu box set, Oshima's "In the Realm of the Senses" and "Empire of Passion" and their 3-disc Shohei Imamura box set. At the same time they, like many other DVD distributors, are also reissuing their catalogues on Blu Ray and it looks like Criterion will be releasing a film that will just get mouths watering once given the HD treatment. That film is Akira Kurosawa's late 1985 masterpiece "Ran".

Already available in the Collection's 2-disc set Kurosawa's retelling of Shakespeare's "King Lear" starring the unmatchable Tatsuya Nakadai will now be featured on a single disc Blu Ray release coming May 12th with all the usual Criterion extras and essays. I can only imagine what the final battle scene would look like in HD with flaming arrows flying through the air and hundreds of extras in period battle armor running through the mud. Breathtaking stuff!